


Reasons Why

by Ankaret



Category: Merlin (BBC)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-18
Updated: 2010-07-18
Packaged: 2017-10-10 15:49:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/101449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ankaret/pseuds/Ankaret
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Morgana reflects on her connection to the boy Mordred.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reasons Why

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kishmet](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Kishmet).



Morgana hurried towards her chambers. The corridors of Camelot were usually empty at this hour, the knights out training, the servants busy in kitchens and chambers, the courtiers asleep; but today it felt as if everyone in Camelot was trying to get in Morgana's way.

She had to find a smile for the woman who strewed rushes and sweet herbs on the Great Hall floor; a look of porcelain disinterest for two of Arthur's knights, elbowing each other on a staircase and arguing about some trick disarm or other; a deep curtsey for the King passing by, and a silent breath of thanks that he didn't choose this morning of all mornings to take her by the chin and lift her up, and enquire into her well-being.

The only one she was grateful to see was Gwen, coming out of Morgana's chambers carrying a bowl covered with a linen cloth. Gwen smiled at her. Morgana smiled back, and felt comforted. "Is the Druid boy any better?"

"Much the same, I think," said Gwen. Her brows drew together, and she gave Morgana a questioning look. "Forgive me if it's a rude question – "

"Why do I care about this one boy, when no doubt there are hundreds going hungry tonight, or being beaten by a stepfather, or turned out of a village for being fathered by a Mercian bandit?" said Morgana.

Gwen gave her a straight-eyed look, and nodded. One of the pleasant things about having Gwen around was that she was never unsettled by Morgana's trick of answering what people were thinking rather than what they said. "Why _do_ you care, my lady? Enough to put your own life in danger for him?"

"I'm the King's ward."

"That won't protect you for ever. You know how he is about – " Gwen lowered her voice. "Sorcery."

"I can't protect all those children," Morgana said uneasily. "I can protect this one."

Gwen looked at her as if she knew that wasn't the whole of the answer, and took the bowl away towards the garderobes. Morgana didn't enquire into its contents.

Morgana let herself into her chambers, and leaned against the heavy wooden door. She closed her eyes. Outside, she could hear the bustle of the city. Inside, she could _feel_ the boy's presence.

The first time she saw him, something inside her _hurt_. It was like the first time her courses had come; a great, secret, shameful alchemical change.

Morgana pushed the curtain aside, and looked at the small figure in the bed. Every time she looked at him the feeling grew stronger. At first it had lessened to nothing when she left the room; now she felt his presence all the time, a cold candle-fire, painting her lungs with frost.

He had never spoken to her. He only _looked_ at her with great pale eyes. Not a child's eyes, not even like looking into the eyes of a hawk or a hunting dog; when she looked at him she felt something rush upward inside her like a great cold furnace, and she felt as if she could hear a high inhuman voice singing at the very edge of her hearing.

_We are tied together, you and I_, she thought. She could not guess at how. Brother and sister? Her father Gorlois had scattered bastards enough about the place, why not among the Druids?

Enemies? That she could believe, though the why and how of it was a skein twisted from Uther's hatred of magic, and Morgana's own half-acknowledged gifts, and whatever the Druids might bring to the spinning.

Lovers? Ten years or more would have to pass for that; and in ten years time, no doubt Morgana would be tending her own nurseries in the castle of one of Uther's favoured vassals, or perhaps some ally king. Far away from Camelot, in any case, and far from the woods and the stone circles in the exposed high places where the Druids still lingered. Very likely in ten years there would _be_ no Druids at all.

Or perhaps she was going mad. No one else seemed to think the boy was anything out of the ordinary. Except for Merlin, and very likely he was only helping to be kind to her, or to Gwen.

She knelt by the bed, and took the boy's hand. "We will make you well," she said. "Gaius will make you well."

He opened his eyes. She felt the burning chill in her ribcage again, and heard the high unearthly sound, like singing with no words in it, and felt the shadows of the future rush over them both and fold them together in its wings.


End file.
